It’s weird that not many folx are truly aware, but March 2022 is Charli XCX month across the land, and not just the ones with hot pink Vs across its flag. Our alt-pop lord n’ savior is set to appear on Saturday Night Live this weekend (March 5), a make-up date for a last-minute cancellation a few weeks back, and her new album Crash changes the course of our lives on March 18.
We’ve been monitoring her singles like NORAD tracks Santa on Christmas Eve (boop… bop… boop), and this week Charli drops a late-’80s freestyle-flavored R&B-pop joint called “Baby.” It was produced by Justin Raisen and Sad Pony, and arrives with a sexy video for “Baby” that was directed by Imogene Strauss and Luke Orlando.
Here’s what she has to say about it all, talking with Zane Lowe on Apple Music 1: “It’s probably the most sexy song I’ve ever made. It’s about sex and sexuality and having good sex and just feeling yourself essentially. I know that that’s the tone. I knew that that was the tone I wanted to carry across for the entire record. This kind of hyper-sexualized, feminine power zone was where I was feeling myself going, and ‘Baby’ was the genesis of this.”
And the video follows the same themes. “I think that’s probably why I wanted to challenge myself on the choreo for this song,” she added, “which was really, really tough and I have so much respect for dancers, professional dancers, anyone who communicates emotion through dance. It is so hard and challenging, but so rewarding.”
Just like Crash itself.